So it this the official prediction thread? Or is this just an over/under thread? And is it "official".
We replaced Nurk (injury) with Whiteside--lateral move (maybe? I see it as a downgrade, but who knows?) Whiteside is the move that concerns me the most as it is the one most essential to the Blazers success until Nurk returns. From a basketball standpoint, I think it's close to a wash, but I do think we're going to miss Nurk's ability to create his own shot. It's from a personality/stability point of view that I'm most concerned. I think Dame is going to be challenged bringing Whiteside into the fold. That said, once Nurk returns, having two centers as talented as these guys are has the potential to be a real difference-maker going into the playoffs. We replaced Meyers with Pau--negligible impact, 'cause it was Meyers I think Pau is going to be a much bigger impact than you're giving him credit for. As player, you're going to get 10-15 solid minutes from him. The dude knows how to play in a way that Meyers can only dream of. His mentorship has the potential to really help Zach Collins. We replaced Chief by promoting Collins--might be an improvement, who knows? This will be a critical point for the Blazers and you're right to highlight it. I don't think that there's any doubt that Zach is more talented than Chief, but he's young and he has a hard time avoiding fouls. He's going to have to grow into his new starting role. It's his third year, so I think that there's reason for optimism. We replaced Curry('s shooting) with Tolliver's--looks like a downgrade to me I think that this is a kind of weird way of looking at three point shooting for the Blazers. While there's no doubt that Curry has the higher shooting percentage over Tolliver, he didn't get that many attempts for it to be a big issue in the overall scheme of things. I don't think that there's much doubt that Hill, Bazemore, Tolliver and Ant collectively add improved 3 point shooting for the team. We replaced Turner with Hezonja--lateral move? Hopefully this is no worse than a lateral move. Hezonja has more of an offensive repertoire than Turner, but he hasn't proved himself yet as a consistent player. ET was a turnover machine at times and a bricklayer from 3, but he did run the second unit well and was great for the team chemistry. The jury is definitely out on this one. We replaced Harkless with Bazemore--lateral move? I'm more inclined to think that Hood will get the starting 3 nod just because of familiarity, but it could be Bazemore. Hood definitely has more offensive game than Moe, but Moe (when healthy) was probably a better defender. Moe wasn't always healthy though. I'd say Bazemore is probably on Moe's level defensively because of wingspan. Overall, I think if you look at the combined attributes of Hood/Bazemore vs Harkless/Layman, this year's SF rotation is better.
Can't see how it can be before training camp and we see these guy play in preseason. Shit the schedule isn't even out! How many back to backs on the road do we have. How many teams are we playing who have had a day off before?
Every single year we all think the Western Conference got Really Really Good, and every year some teams overperform, some under, and some star players get injured or another step slower. And sometimes a guy on your own team breaks out in a really surprising way. The WC has been a bloodbath really for around 20 years. This year isn't that different. It's all about the stars. It added Porzingis, Connely and Kwame, but it lost Durant, and Klay Thompson is gone until after the All Star Break, if not longer. It consolidated two MVP-caliber players (Harden/Westbrook) onto a team where the sum of parts will clearly be worse than the whole, meaning OKC will be much less competitive. And Houston may be less competitive too. It added Zion, but LeBron is now on year 35 (and a billion or so minutes played). Everybody seems to be talking about load management except Portland. Overall, it looks like it got a little harder, but that's assuming stars with long injury histories don't get new injuries. Meanwhile, Portland got better too by upgrading at the center position from Kanter, and I personally think by shifting Collins and Simons into more prominent roles. (I think CJ and Dame have found a whole new level of swagger as well. Deep playoff experience matters.) Lots of pundits and fans look at the conference and the schedule and story lines and do elaborate thought experiments of identifying "winnable games", etc. I tend to evaluate my current team vs recent versions of my teams, figuring all that other stuff is mostly hand waving and guessing at a million factors nobody can predict. Did my team win 53 games last year? Is it a little better to potentially a lot better? Then I should predict more than 53 wins. In the past 6 years I've generally been much closer to the mark than the general consensus on where the Blazers will land record-wise. I could be wrong this year. Time will tell.
I'm a little bit confused if you're talking just 3pt efficiency or over all efficiency?....sure seems like you're talking overall efficiency. if that's so, he didn't 'dip' last season. He actually improved over the previous season and was at or above his career efficiency marks: eFG%: last season .527....season before .506....career .522....(last playoffs .506) PER: last season 17.0....season before 17.0....career 17.2....(last playoffs 17.9) TS%: last season .553....season before .536....career .552....(last playoffs .527) assist/turnover: last season 1.95....season before 1.80....career 1.69....(last playoffs 1.97) now, PER is mostly about volume and raw production but there's a little efficiency metric to it. And, in terms of efficiency CJ was way down in the playoffs. He just made up for it with volume...he attempted 4.1 more FG's in the playoffs then he did in the regular season, and in some games, the timing of those extras FGA's had much higher stakes and were a lot more memorable while those assist/turnover numbers are encouraging on the surface, there's more to it than just that... assists/game: 2015-16 4.3 2016-17 3.6 2017-18 3.4 2018-19 3.0 assist rate: 2015-16 21.6% 2016-17 18.0% 2017-18 15.8% 2018-19 13.8% that's not all bad in that his turnovers have fallen at about the same clip his assists have. Still, that trend is going in the opposite direction of what Portland really needs from him considering how much he has the ball in his hands. That may be even more true next season as there are serious questions if Portland has enough play-making with Turner gone and no backup PG on the roster I'm guessing that a lot of people keep expecting CJ to get back to the level of efficiency and production he posted in 2016-17. His numbers that year were way above his norms, while his other 3 years as a starter all had pretty similar efficiency and production numbers; indicating that 2016-17 may have been an outlier I think it depends on the start of the season * in 2015/16 when Portland won 44, they got of to a 7-12 and 11-20 start * in 2016-17 when Portland won 41, they got off to 8-9 and a 13-20 start * in 2017-18 when they won 49, they got off to a 10-8 and 16-16 start * last season, winning 53, they got off to a 12-5 and 18-13 start all 4 seasons they had hot streaks in the 2nd half of the season, but last season was the first they were +5 wins about 30 games in. That was the margin for winning 53 problem is I think the Blazers will be "finding a footing" like many of the other teams. They will have 3 new starters and about half of their rotation will be new to their Blazer roles. Not only that, the Blazers are making big bets on Zach and Simons. That's pretty thin ice for a good start to the season
3pt%. It's fairly obvious what I said without the need for you to write a thesis about the definition of efficiency. Went from 42% to 37% in two years.
Not gonna nit pick this because it is true. Just thought it was funny. Turner???? Play Making? For who?
ET got blasted on here, but I feel a better with the ball in his hands bringing it up the court than I am with Simons at this point. It going to be a steep learning curve this winter for the young one.
yeah...I felt a little dirty writing that, but Turner was 2nd on the team in assists in fact, of the rotation players, last season, assists/36: Damian Lillard 7.0 Evan Turner 6.3 Jusuf Nurkić 4.2 Nik Stauskas 3.3 CJ McCollum 3.1 21 assists, and Portland is only bringing back 10, and something tells me Whiteside won't be the one to fill in that number
c'mon man...you're the one that brought up efficiency. And in your post, you mentioned 3 pt percentage and TS% AND shot selection. Those are three different things and only 1 of the 3 is exclusively about three's. That's why I said I was a little confused by what you wrote. and you're kind of proving my point about people focusing on CJ's 2016-17 season. That's a definite high water mark yet it's what you seem to be using as some kind of baseline
I have to admit when i was at games i watched how the team in general reacted when he was on the court. He did bring something that the team responded well to.
You're looking at the wrong post. Wiz is basing if off this post where you said: Wiz's point is that the year CJ shot 42% was his "best" season. Expecting CJ to replicate that year in/year out is not realistic. Instead, it should be considered a plausible best case scenario.
Not trying to make a big deal about CJ's 3pt shooting %, but in his first 3 seasons being a full time starter he averaged 41.2%. His last season the average is lower at 37.5%. So last season can also be considered an outlier. I for one believe he will be having more seasons at low 40s and it does seem attainable. Until Simons burst into the GOAT that we all believe he will become.
Except every single possible stat and metric showed that this team was worse on both offense and defense when ET was playing.
